Jul 8 (Reuters) – Mercenary fighters from Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner group are preparing to move to Belarus under the terms of a deal that defuse their mutiny against Russia’s military leadership, a senior official from the group said.
Since the mutiny on June 23-24, in which Wagner’s fighters briefly seized a southern Russian city and marched on Moscow, the exact whereabouts of Prigozhin and his mercenaries have been uncertain.
Under the deal that ended the riot, Prigozhin was to move to Belarus and his men – some of them ex-convicts released early to fight in Ukraine – had the option of moving with him to Belarus, joining Russia’s regular armed forces or returning. to home.
However, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko declared on Thursday that Prigozhin and thousands of his fighters were still in Russia, raising questions about the implementation of the deal.
Anton Yelizarov, whose nom de guerre is “Lotus,” was quoted on Saturday by a Telegram messaging app channel as saying the fighters were on vacation until early August, on Prigozhin’s orders, before moving to Belarus.
“We have to prepare the bases, training camps, coordinate with governments and local administrations, organize interaction with the Belarusian law enforcement agencies and set up logistics,” he said according to the “Yevgeny Prigozhin on Telegram” channel.
Reuters could not verify the authenticity of the interview.
Prigozhin himself has been unusually quiet for the past two weeks. Since June 26, when he defended the mutiny of his fighters, he has not posted on his favorite Telegram channel, Yevgeny Prigozhin Press Service.
An adviser to the Belarusian Defense Ministry said on Friday that no one from the Wagner group had yet visited the abandoned military camp that Lukashenko had offered to the fighters.
Prigozhin, who has long been a strong critic of the Russian Defense Ministry and chiefs of staff for their handling of the war in Ukraine, said he had launched his “justice march” on Moscow to protest corruption and incompetence by Russia. the high command.
(Reporting by Gareth Jones. Editing in Spanish by Javier Leira)
Source: Ambito
